NFL star Michael Vick faces five years in jail

[Pupik]

If an animal is to be eaten or for food or for hunted sport, it's killed much quicker than an animal that is on the brink of death for days, weeks, or months on end for somebody's gambling enjoyment. Yes, these dogs are going to be put to death, that's because they might kill others who might want them as companions.

Now he's an informant, and therefore likely to tick off other scum of society. I'm not envious of Vick, but neither did I put him in his situation.

What boils me is that these guys get a year or two of suspension, and then they get their jobs back. See if that happens with any other career route; short of murder, professional athletes almost always always get another chance with their former employers or leagues.

 

[Josh]

It's sad that with all that's going on in the world one of the biggest stories is this crap.

 

[Swift]

It's sad that with all that's going on in the world one of the biggest stories is this crap.

Thank you! couldn't have said it better myself(but I should've said it earlier)

 

[Kent]

I can see that many of you here don't particularly agree with the possible consequences for Vick but I feel like the consequences are right on. 👍

Let's not forget that this was organized crime as well as animal cruelty. Organized and bank-rolled by Vick, these crimes would earn anyone jail or prison time and if not for his status as a NFL player I doubt anyone would oppose his punishment.

I'm just happy to see more and more of the unacceptable behavior coming from professional sports players being punished in a more appropriate way.
10 years ago I bet Vick would have barely had to worry about this, now he's being made into an example.
Of course, how much of an example he has become is debatable... I'd say we need facts regarding the laws against organizing and funding illegal gambling rings before we can decide if Vick's punishment fits the crime (then we would need to do the same thing for his crimes against animals).

Finally, I just want to mention that the crimes of other people should have nothing to do with whether or not we (as a society) should tolerate this sort of behavior... Then again, I've always been the kind of guy who thought the "he did it before me" excuse wasn't even close to acceptable.
Fact is, Kobe, the NFL stompist, and even OJ, are all totally seperate incidents from this one. To judge the consequences for Vick based on the justice or lack there of, recieved by the other atheletes mentioned is foolish (IMO) as well as irrelavant.

Vick is going down for this and I feel it is completely appropriate (just as I would feel if this same thing was done by John Gotti or Rudy Gulliani).
Then again, that's all just my take and what do I know? Heck, I drive a Toyota.

 

[Danoff]

To judge the consequences for Vick based on the justice or lack there of, recieved by the other atheletes mentioned is foolish (IMO) as well as irrelavant.

My point is that the public response is disproportionate. It's almost as though the general population cares more about dogs than people.

if not for his status as a NFL player I doubt anyone would oppose his punishment.

I would. I don't think gambling should be a crime, and I don't think dog fighting or even animal euthanasia should result in prison terms.

If an animal is to be eaten or for food or for hunted sport, it's killed much quicker than an animal that is on the brink of death for days, weeks, or months on end for somebody's gambling enjoyment.

Unless, of course, you're a bow hunter.

 

[Formula1Driver]

Let's not forget that Mr. Vick was the head/financier of a illegal gambling ring focused on an illegal "sport". There is more to this than animal brutality.

I think the gambling part of this is a different story, the NFL commissioner does not like gambling.

I think that this dog brutality is terrible and disgusting and I cannot even picture someone doing this to a dog or some other animals. Some people say it is the same as killing animals while hunting but I dont think this is in the same category, I have been hunting and killed deer, moose et cetera after we would clean it and eat it later but that is for food. Killing a dog in whatever way because it "under performs" is terrible.

The weird thing about this is Michael Vick was one of my favourite football players and now I have no respect for him.

 

[Kent]

My point is that the public response is disproportionate. It's almost as though the general population cares more about dogs than people.



I would. I don't think gambling should be a crime, and I don't think dog fighting or even animal euthanasia should result in prison terms.



Unless, of course, you're a bow hunter.

Well, I can't say here what I had said in real life, but on your first point... I agree. People do seem to care more about dogs than other people.
That's still no reason to excuse the crimes commited.

Also, regarding gambling... "Should" is a funny word and in this case we aren't here to discuss whether or not gambling should be illegal. In this particular case, we know it is illegal. With that in mind, I believe we should react according to the crime instead of reacting to the action as if it were a legal action.

On a side note, did you know that gambling isn't always illegal?
That's right, there are many places all across the United States where you can gamble on various games ranging from card games to professional sporting games. Horse racing, slot machines, even sports like boxing can be the basis of gambling.
You've just got to do it through the right people in the right places.
Organizing your own dog-fighting ring and funding it does not fall under the umbrella of legal gambling operations (I imagine that has to do with the brutality of the sport rather than the gambling itself). On that note, in my state (Louisiana) rooster fighting (the name I originally used was ****'d out by the swear filter ) was legal until just recently.

 

[Tornado]

With that in mind, I believe we should react according to the crime instead of reacting to the action as if it were a legal action.

Which is a good point. Regardless of if we agree with gambling legislation (I, for the record, do not), Vick went against it. I'm sure that the fact that it is animal fights makes people more angry than if it was, say, card sharking; but he broke the law nonetheless. If 5 years is the length of time for jail that is required for breaking the gambling laws, than he should spend 5 years in jail regardless of animal brutality.
I'm currently putting together a string of thought regarding this question here:

I think it's a seriously disproportionate punishment and I'm quite shocked out how outraged people have gotten about what he's done.

They're dogs people. Kobe Bryant was accused of rape a few years back and people defended him. One of the NFL players was suspended for 5 games (or so) for stomping on a dude's head with metal cleats (attempted murder???). But Vick is invovled in dogfighting and for some reason people have simply had enough.

It makes no sense to me.

And, done. The same reason premeditated crimes are more serious than spur of the moment ones. Kobe was never proven guilty. The head stomper was probably a spur of the moment anger thing. The situation over Vick is premeditated killing of multiple animals in various inhumane ways, not to mention illegal activities surrounding it as well. Simply put, assuming Kobe wasn't guilty, what Vick did is more of a serious thing than the Head Stomper or Kobe's allegations.

 

[Gil]

While killing dogs for sport is wrong, I have no particular feelings one way or the other re: Michael Vick.
A lot of kids that grew up in the "hood" and have fame and money thrust upon them, go a little crazy. Refernce: Mike Tyson, Lindsay Lohan, Anna Nicole Smith, Leon Spinks, John Daly, Owen Wilson, the list goes on.

It's also true that many grow up poor, and get thrust into the limelight, and get stewardship of vast fortunes and come out of it mostly normal.

Do I condone his behavior. No. I was taught that with the exception of food and creatures that pose a danger to you and yours, you do not kill unnecessarily.
But then there are a ****load of guys that go to other countries to hunt big game for sport.
Most of them didn't eat the Lion, Tiger, Cape Buffalo, Mountain Goat, Bear that has sacrificed its head to decorate the "man cave". But we aren't putting those folks in jail.
There really isn't that much difference in the activities, except the actual kill is quicker in most cases.

 

[livemusic]

My point is that the public response is disproportionate. It's almost as though the general population cares more about dogs than people.

I think that if this was done to humans instead of dogs people would be even more revolted.

 

[Kylehnat]

I don't really think so. As a society, we condemn animal cruelty as something more serious than human cruelty, because it is man exerting force over a lesser creature. Sort of a "why don't you pick on someone your own size" thing. Also, a human-pet bond is very different than a human-human bond, so we tend to have different feelings about animal cruelty, because we equate every animal to our beloved pet.

 

[Sage]

What I say is that its more viewpoint than anything else. You paying a guy to pay a guy to pay a guy to kill an animal for food is still you payng a guy to pay guy to pay a guy to kill an animal. For food. Its not you paying a guy to pay a guy to pay a guy to get you lunch. In other places Harming cattle is sacrilegious while Dogs are next to worthless.

Sorry, but I’m an omnivore. You’ll just have to deal with that lovely fact.

What we have here are people killing for pleasure, finding enjoyment in the brutality of another living creature.

There are people (most boys, I’d assume) who derive enjoyment from stomping on ant hills. Should they get five years in prison?

Pardon the hyperbole, but I suspect there are very few people here who would consider laughing while electrocuting a dog on the 'right' side of the perfect greyscale that is right versus wrong.

Why should that matter in terms of criminality? There are plenty of things that people do that I would consider personality flaws or just plain stupid or “wrong”, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it should be illegal.

With that in mind, I believe we should react according to the crime instead of reacting to the action as if it were a legal action.

That makes no sense. At one time it used to be illegal for a black man to marry a white woman – if we were back in those times, and they got married, would you say “I believe we should react according to the crime” (that is, condemning them for breaking the law)?

 

[V1P3R]

So... I guess we are all kidding ourselves... This is racial and nothing to do with animal cruelity.

 

[Tornado]

That makes no sense. At one time it used to be illegal for a black man to marry a white woman – if we were back in those times, and they got married, would you say “I believe we should react according to the crime?”

I fail to see how racism/segregation laws ties into gambling restrictions other than how people disagreed with it and wanted it changed. And, quite frankly, in the time period that they were enforced people must have believed in them because they were enforced, so I don't see the point of your question.
Whether you agree with gambling laws or not, Micheal Vick broke them. That's what his punishment will be for. And regardless of whether you agree with gambling laws or not, I hardly think Vick's prosecution will lead to protests and petitions over revoking gambling laws, especially because of the background of the offense.

 

[Sage]

I’m arguing that just because it’s a law doesn’t make it right. From that, I’m then arguing that 1) gambling laws are stupid, and 2) animal cruelty laws are mostly stupid.

 

[FoolKiller]

Wow, the amount of, 'well, that's the law' arguments is astounding.

Let me make this clear: We understand what the law is, we understand the punishment fits the law, we understand the NFL response is based on the legal consequences and how it affects his contract.

We do NOT agree with the law, we do not agree with the reaction, and I think how the NFL chooses to deal with it is their business, but it is not proportionate to another player violently lashing out against another player in a criminal way.

Standing around saying it is the law and that makes it right does NOT make it right. If people just said, 'well that is the law, so OK' we would still have slaves, no alcohol, homosexuals wouldn't be allowed to be seen in public, etc, etc. If you don't agree with the law saying so is the only way things change. And sometimes you have to say it in a high-profile case, such as this to make the change happen.

Yes, according to current law his punishment is fitting, but according to my morality meter it is not and neither is the public reaction.







And to address the Kobe issue: Everything that chick did made me think she was lying. I kind of hate the way Kobe keeps getting all this spotlight so I wanted him to go down, but I felt if that rape case was what did it then it would have been due to a severe injustice.

 

[Danoff]

I don't really think so. As a society, we condemn animal cruelty as something more serious than human cruelty, because it is man exerting force over a lesser creature. Sort of a "why don't you pick on someone your own size" thing.

That's an interesting point of view, because my entire understanding of morality, law, and justice, is based on the notion that the worst kinds of offenses are done against human beings. This is the same reason we give human beings rights and not animals - so I feel like the proper response to this is to go into the details of why human beings have rights and animals do not, but there's another thread for that.

 

[Kylehnat]

But we get more repulsed when a man kills a baby, who is a human that cannot defend himself, than when he kills his drug-dealer. Should our response be the same in both cases? One could argue that because we see animals as pets (whether they are or not), we equate them with babies: defenseless, harmless beings that depend on our care. This elevates animals to almost-human status.

 

[Swift]

But we get more repulsed when a man kills a baby, who is a human that cannot defend himself, than when he kills his drug-dealer. Should our response be the same in both cases? One could argue that because we see animals as pets (whether they are or not), we equate them with babies: defenseless, harmless beings that depend on our care. This elevates animals to almost-human status.

I'm not angry when a baby is killed because it's defenseless. I'm angry because chances are that child would've groan up and it was robbed of that chance.

Dogs on the other hand, will always be dogs. Animals, very cool animals. But animals none the less.

 

[Danoff]

But we get more repulsed when a man kills a baby, who is a human that cannot defend himself, than when he kills his drug-dealer. Should our response be the same in both cases? One could argue that because we see animals as pets (whether they are or not), we equate them with babies: defenseless, harmless beings that depend on our care. This elevates animals to almost-human status.

Well, this is a tough thing for me to answer because I don't really agree with the premise. I mean, I think drugs should be legal, so obviously the drug dealer isn't the same as a murderer. Is killing a baby worse than killing a dog? Yes. Because it's human.

I think I'm missing your point.

 

[Sage]

I don’t see why killing a drug dealer is “less repulsive” than killing a baby. Why should the supposed viscousness of the crime depend on whether or not the victim can unarm the murderer?

 

[Danoff]

I don’t see why killing a drug dealer is “less repulsive” than killing a baby.

Oooooh! Killing the drug dealer. Got it. I missed that.

I think it's more of a question of innocence. Babies obviously have done nothing wrong - whereas someone who kills his drug-dealer was clearly doing something "immoral" by taking drugs.

Plus, adults are more likely to have "sinned" than children. I think that's the basic premise. I'm not sure I accept it though. I think quite possibly it's worse to kill an adult because an adult has a more thorough understanding of his own mortality and the crime being committed against him. Plus adults are more likely to have responsibilities and emotional ties with others - so the damage is more widespread.

But these are things that our justice system can't and shouldn't be measuring.

 

[Tornado]

Yes, according to current law his punishment is fitting, but according to my morality meter it is not and neither is the public reaction.

I understand and agree with that, and realize that high profile cases like this are the turning points for such laws. However, there is exactly no chance that anyone would attempt to have the law changed based on this incident. Not only would anyone attempting to do so be committing what is essentially political suicide, but he wouldn't get very far in his efforts anyways.
What Vick did was far from civil disobedience (which is usually what people get behind when they want to change laws), especially regarding the extenuating circumstances. That's why I don't think that it really matters whether or not we agree with the law at this point in time, because nothing will be done about it in any cases at least until this fiasco is out of the public eye.

 

[FoolKiller]

I understand and agree with that, and realize that high profile cases like this are the turning points for such laws. However, there is exactly no chance that anyone would attempt to have the law changed based on this incident. Not only would anyone attempting to do so be committing what is essentially political suicide, but he wouldn't get very far in his efforts anyways.
What Vick did was far from civil disobedience (which is usually what people get behind when they want to change laws), especially regarding the extenuating circumstances. That's why I don't think that it really matters whether or not we agree with the law at this point in time, because nothing will be done about it in any cases at least until this fiasco is out of the public eye.

Well, no one is hoping to change laws by complaining on GTP. But when we see we don't think this is such a big deal and that he doesn't deserve the punishment telling us he does, because of the law, does nothing to invalidate our point. Explaining why the law makes sense and is just would invalidate our point, but just saying it is appropriate because of the law does nothing other than quote what the law is, which we already said we disagreed with.

 

[Kylehnat]

But all laws are subjective at their very core (though Danoff would argue that, based on his human rights stance). In any case, at some point, somebody/somebodies decided that dogfighting and gambling is a crime, and by living here, we agree to follow that.

 

[Danoff]

Yup. And that doesn't change the conversation in the slightest.

(and yes, I would argue that morality/justice is not subjective)

 

[Gil]

I'm gonna stump the same point.
MAny of us go on vacation to watch a bunch of men torment and kill a bull.
Then we balk at dogfighting?
While I have no particular love of either thing, it strikes me as an interesting point.
I'll go as far as to raise the racial issue. If it was Lindsay Lohan that was involved in this it would largely be an issue of "youthful exuberance" after all the poor child isn't getting proper parenting.
But we, as a society, want to hang Vick by his testes.
We may have won equality on paper, but in practice...not so much.
We have black atheletes charged with rape of a woman and they go to prison.
We have white atheletes charged with rape of a woman, and they lose their scholarships.
We have white politicians propositioning young boys/men, and their reputation is tarnished.
Now, before you think, I'm pushing aome racial agenda: Yes, I remember that OJ got off in the criminal trial, and Scott Peterson is on death row.

But why does the entire thing have to be a media circus?
Vick is still a man, not some superhero. He's a football player, and most of them that I've known couldn't be considered the brightest bulb in the fixture.
Yes, he has pissed away an enormous opportunity. Too bad for him! Can we move on, now?

 

[Kylehnat]

^Agreed. This has gotten way too much press. Even if this were a backup lineman, the story would have died already. Perhaps the media is excited that someone other than a Bengal or Bear is facing prison time.

 

[FoolKiller]

Yup. And that doesn't change the conversation in the slightest.

Exactly. I can agree to follow the laws, but it doesn't mean I am not allowed to disagree and voice my opinion. That is one of the things that makes America great, I can publicly call the government wrong without fear of my freedom or life.

(and yes, I would argue that morality/justice is not subjective)

While I agree, I bet that just trying to explain this idea to many would be a thread in itself.

I'll go as far as to raise the racial issue. If it was Lindsay Lohan that was involved in this it would largely be an issue of "youthful exuberance" after all the poor child isn't getting proper parenting.

You know, it is easy to pick up the latest white teen pop tart and use them as an example of white people getting off, but I really think this is a celebrity issue more than anything. Eddie Murphy and Bill Cosby have both been arrested for solicitation of prostitutes (one of them transsexual) with no prison time. LA gives ALL celebrities an easy time. If you want a somewhat fair comparison to Lohan let's talk Steve McNair. I mean, he served a ton of jail time for.....oh wait.

But we, as a society, want to hang Vick by his testes.
We may have won equality on paper, but in practice...not so much.
We have black athletes charged with rape of a woman and they go to prison.

Oh, you must mean Kobe.....oh wait.

We have white atheletes charged with rape of a woman, and they lose their scholarships.

You must mean the Duke Lacrosse team. That was a pretty open and shut case of guilt right there.......oh wait.

We have white politicians propositioning young boys/men, and their reputation is tarnished.

You know, I am going through The Smoking Gun's Web site and having trouble finding all that many black politicians who are arrested at all. I am willing to guess that is because the number of black politicians is so low that you can't make a proper comparison here.

Now, before you think, I'm pushing aome racial agenda: Yes, I remember that OJ got off in the criminal trial, and Scott Peterson is on death row.

Bad Comparison. Scott Peterson is not a celebrity. Now Robert Downey Jr is a white celebrity who HAS served jail time for drugs.

We could also talk about Michael Jackson, but I have no clue which side of the racial barrier he is on anymore.

But why does the entire thing have to be a media circus?

One: It involved dogs, so it tugged at our heart strings. Two: He plays football, which people are always trying to demonize with accusations of teaching violence to our children, and then Vick took part in a violent sport/activities. People jumped on it to point out that this is the kind of person we let our children admire when they watch football. Three: He was supposed to be a good guy, pretty boy, a good face for the NFL and that image was destroyed. This the same problem Kobe had, as he was the face of the NBA, a shining example of a great guy that made the NBA look good.


The only difference I can see between Vick and most other celebrity cases is that there were many other defendants that turned on him. If he had been the sole defendant this would have quickly disappeared and would have most likely ended in probation.


Honestly, the only celebrities that do a lot of time are the ones involved in shootings, unless they are Puff Daddy (wait, isn't he black?). And then these people are involved in an attempted or successful murder and do, maybe, a year. Wait, now that I think about it, what was R. Kelly's punishment? Anything? That was sex (and other things) with minors on videotape. He went to court and I never heard another word after that.


Honestly, there is no race card to pull here. If this had been Peyton Manning instead of Vick the media circus would have been bigger. But that is probably because Peyton Manning can actually throw a ball.

 

[Danoff]

If this had been Peyton Manning instead of Vick the media circus would have been bigger.

...because he really is the face of the NFL. That and everyone loves him for his squeaky clean image and work ethic (me included).